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You like to think what you have learned and the business knowledge you
have retained along your long and varied career path is unique, proprietary,
or even original , but somewhere deep inside you know that most of the
things you hold near and dear to your own business self identity probably
were already developed, practiced, and taught way before you ever entered
your first business conference room.
You sincerely hope that attempting to document your Cardinal Rules for
Business Growth in an article of this nature will somehow make sense to
other business people, or better yet, your written contributions get added
to other s own personal list of business do s and don ts.
Ultimately a business must sustain itself with profits to continue its
legacy. Without consistent sales revenues and reasonable expense control it
eventually makes little difference what else you may attempt do to continue
to advance the future of the enterprise. Businesses need to grow because
those that are risking their hard earned investment in the business
logically expect a reasonable return on that capital.
The simple reality of business is, if there is not a reasonable return on
money invested in a company, it makes more financial sense to put that same
money in a fixed, guaranteed return paper investment. Never again would you
have to worry that your competition is about to make your entire product
line obsolete!
Before we get into my list of Cardinal Rules of Business Growth, it is
most appropriate to acknowledge two fundamental business assumptions that
relate to this list:
- Businesses are made up of people, working together
for a common cause, existing by focusing on solving other people s problems,
namely the customer
- No matter how good you think you are, how effective
your team is and how much of the targeted markets you have cornered, there
is, and always will be, another company attempting to do what you do better, cheaper, and more consistently than you ever thought. Your ultimate goal
is to delay that from happening!
A for profit company must have a plan and a clearly defined strategy,
made up of tactics to achieve desired results. This article will focus on
tactical efforts one should consider, in one form or another, to maximize
the probability of continued, profitable growth.
A very successful business mentor of mine once told me, If it is
important enough to throw money at, it is important enough to write down in
black and white so if you have a business plan, a business strategy and a
few tactics to pull it off, be sure to write them down! At least you have a
fighting chance to improve upon the matter at hand if it is written.
Thoughts, concepts and ideas are difficult to improve upon otherwise!
Give priority to new product or service development: Always seek ways to
improve what you have to offer and develop means to obsolete your own
products or services before someone else does
Find new applications for existing products or services: Be sure to
establish a communication means between your company and your product /
service users to determine how they really use your products. Offering a
financial incentive to surface news applications helps too!
The easiest sale of them all: You have already spent the money to acquire
your customers and build a relationships with them, why not ask what else
can you make or provide for them?
Know where to get all the answers: ALL the answers about how your company
is doing, where it should go and what it should stop doing, reside within
your own customer base. Just ask!
Buy rather than Build: Take a good look at your targeted industry. There
usually is a resourced limited company who offers viable products and
services that relate to yours. Consider buying them versus investing the
same money in an organic growth alternative.
Think out of boundaries! If you just focus on US markets, someday you
will find your company can no longer effectively compete because someone
else beat you to the global market game board, the board the business game
of tomorrow will be played on
Go E Commerce! Establish an effective means, via the Internet, for your
customers to educate and update themselves, solve their own problems and
order your products with a few clicks of a computer mouse
Know when to say No and Stop! The most effective business leaders know
when to say no and when to say stop ! Making or doing something that no
longer makes financial sense needs to be dealt with decisively, no matter
the, We have always made those , We have always sold those or We have always
done it that way commentary.
Measure and publish everything: Business practices can only be improved
upon if they are written, measured, tracked and periodically audited for
effectiveness. All results justify being shared with all employees, good or
bad. Always celebrate success publicly, criticize poor performance
privately.
There is always a price to pay for business growth. The process is always
laden with mistakes, unexpected surprises, opportunities to learn new
things, always offering another chance for future growth opportunities.
There is no clear roadmap on how to best grow your company, each company has
its own growth challenges.
Hopefully these Cardinal Rules for Business Growth stimulated some
creative thought to make your business growth tactics that much more
effective. In today s global business environment the competitive edge we
strive for gets thinner every day, growth is the price we pay to maintain
that edge.
